1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of network connectivity for roaming mobile end users and more particularly to the field of network optimization profile generation in performance optimizing network connections during roaming.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a mobile computing environment, it is often required that users be allowed to connect to computing resources over a variety of types of network technologies with minimal disruption of the application environment. Virtual private network (VPN) tunneling enables mobile users to connect to different computing resources from remote locations, as a VPN can provide a tunnel for passing traffic to a backend network through an application-transparent virtual connection. Advantageously, VPN tunneling can support roaming in which an established VPN tunnel can switch from one physical network to another seamlessly so that client applications remain connected as the VPN tunnel switches between physical networks.
In this regard, roaming involves switching between physical networks while keeping the VPN tunnel open and undisrupted. Yet, because the performance characteristics of each different physical network may vary widely, for each virtual connection it is preferred to optimize the manner in which the traffic is handled for each physical network as much as possible. To with, performance optimization includes adjusting connectivity settings such as compression levels, header reduction, packet buffering and packet joining, and transport control protocol (TCP) retransmission suppression.
Performance optimization for each different physical connection can be expressed in a network optimization profile in which preconfigured sets of optimization settings can be stored for application to a VPN tunnel at connection time or roam time based upon the physical network from which a roaming device connects. Still, very often it can be difficult for the operator of the virtual network to obtain a properly configured optimization profile. In this regard, network optimization profiles ordinarily are manually created either in a lab environment by the vendor of the virtual network, or in the field by the operator of the virtual network. In the former circumstance, the efficacy of a generated network optimization profile is limited to the physical network represented in the lab environment and not in the field. In the latter circumstance, a level of expertise can be lacking.
Consequently, successfully deployed network optimization profiles tend to be tuned for general performance rather than for the specific application needs of the virtual network operator. To the extent that the end user attempts to tune the optimization profile to meet the specific needs of the field, the end user tends to lack enough specialized expertise necessary to create optimization profiles for each carrier network that may be serviced by the virtual network, for example a virtual network serving 802.11, code division multiple access (CDMA), and a non-Internet protocol (IP) Mobitex network, that it is common for the end user to degrade network performance by mis-configuring the optimization settings of the profile during manual tuning.